Holidays don’t just restore. They also reveal.
Newsletter #23
It’s one of those times in the year where I’m not quite sure what the day is.
I’m working on weekends and taking days off in the week so that I can hang out with my children, take time off to relax, squeeze in visits to family and friends and still do some work.
Inevitably the usual tempo of work has to beat differently over the school holidays. I always enjoy this change when it comes though, a welcome bridge in what easily becomes a monotonous tune of Monday to Friday working.
This year’s change of pace has had me remembering summers as a child. Growing up in a Northern coastal town the summer holidays brought all sorts of weird and wonderful traditions from a charity Bed Race, where a team member was pushed around all the town’s pubs for a pint in each! Unsurprisingly that tradition has not survived!
There was an Edwardian Festival that included riding on a float (with Brownies or Guides for me) dressed up in some kind of era appropriate clothes. And one of my favourite things ever, a game where you had to spot the ‘oddity’ in the town’s shop window displays.
Where my father’s from in another Northern Coastal spot but this time in Spain, summer brings fiestas to the local towns. These were always such fun as they included amazing food, dancing and bag-pipes (Galicia has a rich Celtic heritage).
From May Pole dance routines learnt at school (I have fond memories of mastering how to weave a Spider’s Web pattern, even if, as my mum recently reminded me, the final performance was rained off - couldn’t be more British!) to time spent with a friend and thousand of others at Valencia’s Tomatina festival, where you hurl tomatoes at each other and it’s oddly unifying.
I’ve been thinking this week about these and other weird and wonderful rituals that bring people together for rest, laughter and celebration during the summer months. How the change in rhythm lets us step outside of our usual cadence and experience things differently. The “always-on” culture, the illusion of importance, the tyranny of the to-do list, the pressure to be productive - they all lose their grip when you feel the comfort of familiar faces or sand between your toes.
Listening to a podcast1 yesterday I was also reminded how workers have historically used holidays, like May Day, to protest. Time to gather and reflect can be dangerous to the status quo. Suddenly, what once felt urgent or important doesn’t anymore.
No wonder Keir Starmer wouldn’t offer a bonus Bank Holiday to celebrate the Lionesses’ European victory, freedom from routine and time for joy and reflection are always a bit too risky.
Rest is restorative and disruptive. That’s why it’s so often denied. When people stop working and come together to dance and celebrate collectively, something else happens. It becomes a chance to see the cracks in the current system. And a chance to imagine a different way.
Which brings us to this week’s question:
Why this question?
From bed races to bagpipes, summer has always been a time of sanctioned weirdness.
But here’s the thing, rituals like that don’t just entertain, they also disrupt. They give people the space, in a very busy world, to reflect, to rebel, to remember what really matters and to recognise what might be getting in the way of that.
So while you’re out of routine this summer, on a beach, in the garden, halfway through a lazy afternoon try finishing this prompt:
“When I’m out of routine,
I notice that I…”
Maybe it’s noticing how you sleep differently. Or what you reach for when you're bored. Or how long you can go without checking your phone. Whatever surfaces, jot it down. Come September, it might help you decide what to bring forward into the news school year and what to leave behind.
Till Next Week,
P.S. Want to share what you noticed? Feel free to message me directly - my reply may take a little longer than usual. 🏖️🩴🍦
Inspiration & Credits:
I hope giving some distance between sources and their links frees you from ending up in an unintended rabbit hole! If you’re interested though - click away!
The Book on Fire podcast - I can’t recommend this podcast enough, their episodes on Caliban and the Witch are brilliant!